"He's (President Barack Obama) really targeting a broad swath of the American public and he's getting to them through their weathermen," McBride explained. "TV is the number one source of news for Americans - just by a smidge. Most Americans go to television and then the internet, right behind television. And when they go to television, they're going for one big reason - weather news. So they may not trust the weather forecaster on climate change, but they certainly trust them about whether or not it's going to rain today."

But not all meteorologists agree on climate change science.

"The American Meteorological Society actually mirrors the Republican Party. Only about 52 percent of them believe it's a real thing," said McBride. "So if Obama can convince even just a handful of them to take the science more seriously, he could make headway in public policy."

Florida and other Southeastern states are "exceptionally vulnerable" to sea level rise, extreme heat events, hurricanes and a decreasing freshwater supply, according to the National Climate Assessment released Tuesday.

The Natural Resources Defense Council thinks states like Florida should start preparing for problems caused by climate change -- rising coastal waters and interior droughts -- even if they don't believe climate change is real.

Ben Chou* -- the author of a new state-by-state analysis of climate change readiness -- tells WUSF that even non-believers can get behind the idea of better safe than sorry.

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure and in the long run the costs of not preparing for climate change far outweigh the costs of planning now," he said.